Due to lack of formal definition, a sink is often misconstrued with a gateway which is a similar construct but the latter is usually either an end-point or allows bi-direction communication between dissimilar systems, as opposed to just an event input point[citation needed]. This is often seen in C++ and hardware-related programming[citation needed], thus the choice of nomenclature by a developer usually depends on whether the agent acting on a sink is a producer or consumer of the sink content.

The word sink has been used for both input and output in the industry. Mobile sink is proposed to save sensor energy for multihop communication in transferring data to a base station (sink) in wireless sensor networks.